OSAKA (TR) – Osaka Prefectural Police have sent a deceased 17-year-old boy to prosecutors over a leap he took from a department store store roof in Osaka City last year that killed himself and a pedestrian below, reports NHK (Jan. 13).
On Wednesday, police sent papers on the boy, a high school student, to prosecutors on suspicion of gross negligence resulting in death.
At around 5:50 p.m. on October 23, the boy leaped from the HEP Five department store, located near JR Osaka Station, onto the street below, striking Kako Furukawa, a 19-year-old university student living in Furukawa City, Hyogo Prefecture.
The boy was confirmed dead at a hospital about 40 minutes later. Kako died the following day.
In filing the paperwork, police alleged that “the boy knew that there were many people on the streets of Umeda, and, if he jumped, there would be a risk of involving a passersby.”
The boy indicated on social media that he was contemplating suicide. “I am troubled by schoolwork,” he confided to a person close to him. However, a suicide note was not found, police said.
On the 10th floor roof, police found the boy’s student identification card inside a bag. The roof is not accessible by the general public. Immediately before the incident, guards responded to an alarm signaling that a door to the roof had been opened.
